The Humble Beginnings of Linux

All during the development of the kernel, concurrent
development was being done on the tools I've mentioned, as well as
others. One of the topics of discussion by users was what they
collected for their system. Since new users didn't want to hunt the
net for the critical pieces, the idea of a “standard distribution”
was established.

One common medium of exchange has been the floppy disk, so
the distribution kits have generally been cast in terms of images
of MS-DOS-readable disks. One can copy a friend's disk set and then
bootstrap Linux. If you're anywhere near a large community, chances
are there is a Linux or Unix users group nearby. If you're lucky,
you'll find a set of floppies to borrow. If that fails, it's almost
certain you'll find someone who will copy their distribution to
your floppies.

These distribution kits are generally deposited or maintained
on an ftp site and mirrored to other ftp sites. Many bulletin
boards maintain copies of these distributions. This gives you a
second path to acquire Linux: all you have to do is download 50
Mbyte via modem.

The third and, I think, most significant path to acquiring
Linux is CD-ROM. A number of companies publish one or more (I've
seen as many as four) distributions on a single CD-ROM. The
companies add lots of other material, such as X-Windows, the GNU
sources and snapshots of archive sites (which contain other,
non-distribution kit software), to their packages and sell them for
$20 to $40. Since you can easily spend $20 in floppy disks for a
distribution kit alone, this is quite a bargain! When one can now
buy a single-speed CD-ROM drive for less than $100, getting a
distribution by way of CD-ROM is very attractive.

It should be noted that distribution kits have different
numbering than the kernel itself, and CD-ROMs may have yet another
way of identifying versions. This can lead to confusion when
someone refers to “the Fall 1993 release” or “the 2.0 release”. If
you look at /usr/src/linux/Makefile, you'll find the version, patch
level, and sub-level in the first few lines. Look at the
README-type files in the root of the distribution to determine the
kit's version.

It's Deja Vu All Over Again

My first experience with Unix was in 1980, when I was handed
three 2400' reels of half-inch magnetic tape and a two-foot high
stack of xerographed manual pages. I was pointed to the VAX and
wished the best of luck.

Those were heady times, living on the edge, working without a
safety net. One's phone list (of other system administrators) was
critical to one's survival. Everyone (the system administrators and
select students) had the source code, and one was expected to dive
into the kernel and fix things.

But things got boring for a while in the late 1980s: vendors
distributed only object files for their Unix systems and there were
commercially-available support groups to call. One was expected to
manage configuration files and submit bug reports—and then wait
for a correction.

In a conversation just last week, I pointed out that those
golden days are with us again, only better. First, the number of
sites and kernel programmers has grown ten-fold or a hundred-fold,
so there are more folks contributing fixes and improvements.
Second, since we're running on personal computers, the effects of
our changes are localized, and we're even more free to explore.
Finally, with widespread Internet service, we're so much better
connected to one another.

These are such interesting times!

Randolph Bentson
(bentson@grieg.seaslug.org)
has been programming for money since
1969-writing more tasking kernels in assembly code than he wants to
admit. His first high-level language operating system was the UCSD
P-system. For nearly 14 years he has been working with Unix and for
the last year he's been enjoying Linux. Randy is the author of the
Linux driver for the Cyclades serial I/O card.